Nocturnals or The lost boys invites us into children's fantasies, in the world of fairy tales with many references,
including Peter Pan by James Matthew Barrie, Le Petit Poucet by Charles Perrault, and The Thousand and One Nights.
Each image is a fairy tale scene and the whole series can be read as a journey of initiation in three parts, from the city to the wild, always in a nocturnal atmosphere.
Indeed, the blue of the image shows an unreal night. With its light and its tint, it transforms landscapes into theatrical sets. A blue, that also responds to that of water,
a recurrent element of the series. And, if the words Royal blue and Cobalt blue exist, one should certainly invent the Oneiric blue for this photographic work.

Behind this blue, a small boy, wearing pyjamas, keeps close to him his "Blancky". He's accompanied by an older child.
This other boy seems to wait for him, protect him, or brings him.
He takes often place in the shadow of the image, back or with a hood over his head. Sometimes, he is out of the picture, leaving the youngest alone. In Nocturnals or The lost boys,
the concept of " out of frame " takes a great place, as important as the image itself: Where is the one that doesn't appear? What does the little hero try to catch on the fence?
Against whom the boy is pointing his stick? What is there down the street? So many questions that suggest those of the spectator place,
of the role that we occupy or that we would like to occupy, in these fairy tales scenes.

Because Mireille Loup tells us of our forgotten children. One will regain our fears, our fascinations or fear of water,
our fears mixed with excitement of the World night, our certainty about the existence of enchanted caves, flying carpets, forests inhabited, buried treasures.
During a moment, the artist makes us believe that imaginary worlds exist. And for all of us, an image at least, of those that she proposes to us,
will emerge a souvenir of our childhood, like the Marcel Proust madeleine.

Nocturnals or The lost boys has been produced by biennale internationale de la photographie et des arts visuels (Liège),
Centre de Photographie (Lectoure), Centre Photographique d'Ile-de-France.